Your liver is one of few organs in your body that has the ability to regenerate. Most of the time, when a tissue in your body dies, it's dead. Even the Greeks knew about the liver's ability to regenerate, which is why they have the story of Prometheus, who was punished for giving fire to man.
Because of this, he was chained to a rock, and every single day, an eagle would come and eat part of his liver, and every single night it would grow back. As the story goes, this cycle repeated forever.
But Just because your liver can grow back, doesn't mean you should treat it like crap. Your liver is easily one of the most important organs and tissues inside of your body. It's responsible for storing vitamins and minerals, for activating hormones like your thyroid, for producing life-giving cholesterol, for converting building blocks into different forms of energy, for regulating amino acids, for clearing drugs and poisonous compounds from your body, and so much more, you simply can't live without a liver. Let's talk about eight habits that you are probably doing right now that are slowly destroying your liver. Number one, alcohol intake.
Bad Habits That Are Destroying Your Liver
1. Alcohol intake
It's best to think of alcohol as a toxin to your liver, and you need far less of this toxin to cause damage than you probably think. One binge drinking session is enough to trigger fatty liver accumulation and inflammation. While binge drinking is bad, chronic daily consumption is even worse.
Prolonged alcohol use blocks the export of fat out of your liver and leads directly to fatty liver. This in turn may lead to alcoholic hepatitis and eventually an irreversible condition known as cirrhosis, and believe it or not, cirrhosis from alcohol consumption is one of the most common reasons for a liver transplant, especially in western world.
A dose as small as 30 grams per day for 10 years dramatically increases your risk of developing liver problems. For perspective, 30 grams is the equivalent to two and one third shots of hard alcohol. Some health advocates and doctors will say that mild consumption of alcohol has no problem.
But if you are trying to optimize your health, then I would recommend staying away from alcohol 100 percent. Whatever small benefits you may obtain from something like a small glass of wine each day can be easily made up for by eating other nutrient dense foods or improving your sleep. I don't buy the argument that drinking wine improves your longevity.
There are many different ways to improve your health if that's your goal. Eliminating alcohol from your diet will improve your overall health, it has the potential to help you lose weight, will help you balance blood sugar, will help improve cholesterol and help you get better sleep.
2. Eating too much sugar
Note here that I said too much sugar, I'm a big fan of natural sources of sugar like fruits and vegetables. But there's no question that eating excessive amounts of processed sugar can cause liver problems.
The real issue here isn't sugar so much as it is fructose similar to alcohol, fructose must be metabolized by the liver and eating too much of it blocks the export of fat out of the liver. And just like alcohol, too much sugar can lead to fatty liver and all of the other problems I just mentioned.
Sadly, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is becoming one of the most common causes of liver transplant. And it's a cause that can be completely avoided. The two worst things that you can do for your liver are 100% in your control and are 100% preventable.
Some health gurus, especially in the carnivore and keto spaces, suggest that all sources of sugars and carbohydrates are bad and cite these problems as the reason why. But this is not the case. Your liver was designed to process sugar and fructose, just not too much of it.
The issue isn't necessarily the consumption of fructose, but the dose that you are taking. Eating three to five servings of fruit each day isn't going to cause non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, but drinking several 44-ounce Big Gulps every day might. There's a big difference between these two sources of fructose.
Don't be scared of sugar, but definitely respect it for the potential damage that it can cause. It's worth noting here that at least one study has shown that you can cut back on refined and processed sugars while still consuming natural sugars found in fruits and still see metabolic benefits. So it is not the case that fructose from all sources are created equal.
The bottom line here is that foods with added sugar should be avoided at all costs. But feel free to consume healthy whole foods that have sugars naturally built into them. Using this rule, an apple would be fine, but a can of pasta that has added sugar would not.
3. Taking too many prescription medications
Everything, and I mean everything, must be broken down and metabolized by your liver, and that includes prescription medications. Your liver takes these compounds and turns them into water-soluble substances that can then be eliminated by your kidneys.
The enzymes that do the bulk of the work here are a family of enzymes known as cytochrome P450. And even though these enzymes are pretty darn good at what they do, you can definitely overwork them. If you're taking multiple medications that all use the same family of enzymes for their metabolism, these medications can start to build up in your system and cause problems to your liver and also to other systems in your body.
This is why, by the way, that doctors will tell patients who are taking certain prescription medications to avoid grapefruit juice. Grapefruit juice blocks certain enzymes from functioning in the liver, which can lead to a buildup of those medications inside of your system. If you're only taking a few medications, that probably isn't going to be an issue.
But my recommendation to you is to use lifestyle factors to help you use as few medications as possible. When you look at the top five most commonly prescribed medication, four of them are used to treat conditions that can be treated naturally with lifestyle changes, such as diet, exercise, and improving your lifestyle. It's a far better use of your time to improve your lifestyle so you can get off of these medications instead of worrying about which ones hurt your liver and which don't.
4. Using too many supplements
I'm a huge fan of supplements, and I even formulate my own supplements for people with thyroid problems and people with weight problems. And I hate to say it, but too many supplements can definitely cause liver problems as well.
This is especially true of certain botanical or plant-based compounds. I remember seeing a patient in residency that came in with symptoms of acute liver problems that looked like an aggressive case of liver cancer. When she was admitted to the hospital, we took her off all medications and all supplements, and her symptoms magically resolved within a number of days.
This blew everyone away because we thought she had a severe case of cancer, and the only thing we could pin it back to was some herbal supplements that she started taking a few weeks before for weight loss. This isn't meant to scare you from taking away supplements, by the way, because they can definitely be helpful, and instead highlights how effective they can be when used correctly and how potentially harmful they can be when they're not used correctly.
There's a reason that certain supplements have a high-end threshold or recommended dose and a reason why these supplements get tested before they're given to people.
As long as you stick to standard dosing and supplements that are manufactured and created in the United States under GMP guidelines, you shouldn't have anything to worry about, but it's probably not a good idea to get your supplements from overseas, especially where they aren't regulated as well.
It's also still a good idea to limit your total intake of supplements. If your total supplement stack exceeds 10 supplements every single day, it's probably time to cut some of those out and get more nutrients and minerals from food.
5. Having unsafe sex
How does having sex relate to your liver? Because hepatitis A, B, and C can all be sexually transmitted. These viruses are all incredibly damaging to the liver and can cause both temporary and long-term liver problems if not treated appropriately.
Doctors do a pretty good job of catching these viruses early, so it isn't usually a big deal. Doctors do a pretty good job of catching these viruses early, but it's still a very good idea to limit your exposure to them by practicing safe sex and limiting your number of sexual partners. Your liver will thank you.
6. Not exercising enough
Exercise is obviously beneficial for your entire body, but it's especially beneficial for your liver for three reasons. The first is that it increases fatty acid oxidation, decreases fatty acid synthesis, and prevents both mitochondrial and hepatocellular damage.
This is just a fancy way of saying it protects your liver and helps it function better. The second is that it promotes better insulin sensitivity. This reduces the delivery of excess sugar to the liver and prevents fatty buildup inside of the liver.
It also helps treat conditions like diabetes and high blood sugar. The third is that it stimulates lymphatic flow and promotes detoxification of potentially harmful compounds through the sweat. To get these benefits, make sure that your exercise is intense enough to cause you to sweat and long enough to have a stimulating impact on your muscles.
Exercising three to five times per week for 20 to 30 minutes should do the trick.
7. Taking too much vitamin A
High doses of vitamin A are considered toxic to your liver. This is because your liver acts as a storage center for vitamin A. This is also why, by the way, that eating the liver of animals is one of the best ways to naturally get vitamin A from food.
You don't really have to worry about getting too much vitamin A from supplements though, if you are using standard everyday multivitamin doses. But it can be a real issue here if you are using super concentrated vitamin A supplements and combining that with the intake of high vitamin A foods like liver. This problem can also occur with high doses of vitamin A found in certain prescription medications.
For instance, the prescription medication tretinoin, which is often used to treat acne in teenagers, can cause liver toxicity and liver damage. This is why patients taking this medication need to have routine liver tests.
8. Taking too much Tylenol
Probably one of the scariest on this list is Tylenol. And that's because Tylenol is super easy to get, it's incredibly toxic to your liver at high doses, and very few people are aware of the negative impact it can have on your liver. This trifecta is the perfect setup for Tylenol induced liver damage in certain populations, especially those people who have chronic pain conditions and in those people who take Tylenol every day.
The maximum daily intake of Tylenol should not exceed 4,000 milligrams every day. For context, just two capsules of extra strength Tylenol contain 1,000 milligrams. This means the total amount of Tylenol you should take should never exceed eight capsules of extra strength Tylenol.
How much Tylenol does it take to damage your liver? Not as much as you might think. Taking as little as 7,000 milligrams, or in other words, 14 capsules of extra strength Tylenol, is enough to cause severe symptoms. Ever wonder why Tylenol bottle caps are so hard to open, especially the children's version? This is why.
Tylenol is probably one of the most potentially toxic compounds for liver health found in an everyday grocery store. The good news is that making small changes in your day-to-day life can have a positive impact on liver health, and you can continue to take advantage of all the benefits that your liver provides for the rest of your life.
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